The Future Is Not What It Seems
by Jin Kumasaka
Summary: James Phillips, local school boy lives a regular life. His life is about to change however, when he is attacked by a madman in the back alleys of 2050's New York. -SET BEFORE THE EVENTS OF DEUS EX: INVISIBLE WAR-
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: I do/did not, unfortunately, own/create Deus Ex and Deus Ex: Invisible War. Try and sue me if you want, you'll get nowhere. I only made this for entertainment only, not to make a quick buck. Also I know that there are some things that you can't do in Deus Ex: Invisible War that are in here, I just put them in to make the biomodification seem more advanced.

Prologue  
_Date: 15-9-2050_

James sighed as he stared at his computer screen. 26 emails, the result of not clearing out your inbox for a month. He scanned through the subjects of each email. Month old 16th birthday greetings from friends and relatives, junk mail, newsletters from websites, the usual.

"God," he said as he prompted the PC to shut down. "I'll sort them out later." Standing up, James stretched, heading over to a coat rack.

"We live in a future of high technology and yet there isn't a way to get rid of junk mail..." He grabbed a black leather jacket from the rack and slipped it on, opening the door to the house. Before leaving he turned around to face inside.

"Just going out for an hour or so, I'll see you later mum." From inside, a young female voice answered back.

"Alright love, see you later." James closed the door and headed down the street, shoving his hands into his pockets. He sighed as he began to wonder where his dad was, the wonder quickly turning into hate. Soon after James was born, his dad began drinking and hardly went to work. When James turned four, his father left his mother for another woman; a secretary at his workplace. He laughed grimly.

"I thought that only happened in movies and books..." James sighed and then stopped, suddenly noticing he took a wrong turning into a bunch of back alleys.

"Oh great, just my luck..." He looked around for any ways out but couldn't see any. I must have wandered further in then I thought, he thought to himself. Someone barged past James, almost knocking him over. James turned to shout at the person, then hesitated. The person was carrying guns in his hands and had a shotgun on his back. _Probably an arms dealer...gotta get out of here before I cause trouble for myself,_ he thought to himself. James started to wander around the back alleys, but this eventually ended up in him getting even more lost and confused. He sighed and turned around, coming face to face with a man wearing slightly scruffy clothes. James mumbled a word of apology and began to walk around the man. His face suddenly came into contact with the man's chest as the man neatly sidestepped to block James' path. James tried again to walk past the man, but the man blocked him again. James was loosing his cool, and fast.

"Listen, I don't have a problem with you, and you don't have a problem with me, so could I pass?" James said, a hint of annoyance in his voice. The man just slowly shook his head, then spoke.

"Have to make way for the future..." James slowly blinked.

"What do you mean by 'Make way for the future'?"

"You may not realise it...but it's coming..." James backed up a little. He was beginning to think this guy was a madman.

"What is?" The man suddenly sprung a small combat knife and grinned.

"The age of biomodified humans...and I must destroy those who threaten that future!" The man quickly slashed at James with the knife, but James jumped back, quickly turning around and running from the now apparent madman. In school James was the fastest runner in his school and could outrun most adults. But looking back, James saw the madman was on his tail and closing in on him.

"Jesus Christ, how can he be so fast?!" James turned into another alleyway and quickly hid behind some trashcans. Watching from a gap, he saw the madman run into the alley and right past him. He was lucky that he has ran into this alley; it was short enough to make the madman think he had been and gone. The madman stopped near the end of the alleyway and appeared to be thinking. James waited, trying to keep his breath silent. Eventually, the man ran down an alley to the left. Slowly getting out from his hiding place, James breathed a sigh of relief, turning to go the way he came. Suddenly, a sharp stabbing pain came from the back of his knee and he screamed in agony. James looked back and saw the madman, knife in hand, waving his finger and tutting.

"Not going to loose me THAT easily, boy..." James looked where the pain was coming from and saw the combat knife he tried to attack James with. Normally James would had wondered how someone can throw a combat knife so accurately, but all that was going through his mind at that time was pulling the knife out and running away. He gritted his teeth and yanked the knife out, wincing as it made the wound slightly worse. Looking back one more time, James saw the man slowly walking towards him. He looked forward and began to ran, disadvantaged by his wound. He tried to run into every short alleyway, taking turns every chance he could get, in an attempt to loose the madman. Eventually he saw something that made his heart jump for joy; an exit into the main streets. He ran towards it, hoping that the madman wouldn't follow him into broad daylight. Suddenly, James felt another stabbing pain in two places in his back. He screamed again and fell to the floor. Before he could see if his screams were heard, the madman was over him, quickly turning him around, causing the pain in his back to worsen. James suddenly realised he was still holding the knife from his knee and slashed at the man, cutting him from near the bottom of the man's eye to the side of his face. The man growled and pulled out another knife. He stabbed James in the chest and James cried out weakly. His vision was beginning to fade and he couldn't see very well. James saw the outline of the man raise the knife again, then he heard gunshots. Those were the last things he saw before his world went pitch black.


	2. Chapter 1: The First Day Of The Rest Of ...

Chapter 1: The First Day Of The Rest Of Your Life  
_Date: 17-9-2070_

James slowly awoke to the sound of bleeps and voices. His vision was blurry, but he could make out the outline of someone standing over him. He quickly sat up, looking around. The figure began to speak.

"So you're finally awake then." The voice was female and middle aged. James looked at the figure as his vision slowly returned to normal. The figure was a middle-aged woman wearing a white doctors jacket and a blue shirt.

"Welcome back James, you've been asleep for ages...how do you feel" It was at that point that James' head started to ache. He led down again, bringing a palm up to his head.

"Like there's a full scale riot in my head...and the police just brought in reinforcements...where am I" The woman smiled a little.

"You're at New York Hospital. I'm Dr Hunt"

"Nice to meet you..." Dr. Hunt folded her arms.

"Do you remember anything from the incident?" James nodded a little.

"Yeah...some psycho tried to kill me...he threw a knife at the back of my knee and two knifes at my back. He also stabbed my chest...think where the right lung is." James looks down at his body to find himself wearing hospital pyjamas. He lifts up the top and looks where the madman stabbed him to find the wound had healed. He checked the back of his knee; that had healed as well.

"Man...you doctors do a good job...healed in no time at all and no scars!" Dr. Hunt just looked at James and sighed.

"James it wasn't in no time at all....you've been here a while..." James nodded.

"Ah, about a week or so, maybe a few days even?" Dr. Hunt shook her head.

"No...Twenty years." James was silent for a while, then he started laughing.

"Twenty years, good joke doctor." Dr. Hunt shook her head again.

"I'm not joking, you've seriously been here twenty years...here, I'll bring you today's paper" Dr. Hunt walks towards a table and picks up a newspaper from the table, bringing it back to James.

"Here, check the date" James nods, looking for the date.

"Alright, but I don't see what- Thursday, 17th May, 2070?!!?" James couldn't believe his eyes. He really was there at the hospital for twenty years.

"....ok doc, could you tell me what the hell is going on?" Dr. Hunt nodded and brought a chair up to James' bedside, sitting in it.

"Ok, here we go..." And so Dr. Hunt told James everything that had happened in 20 years; He was brought in and operated on. The operation was almost a success, but he needed his aging process to be stopped so his organs wouldn't grow in order for him to live normally. A year later a man called J.C. Denton caused a worldwide panic by starting what is now called the Collapse. Versalife was shut down and UNATCO was disbanded. A company called Tarsus was created and developed training schools, which were named Tarsus Academies. James listened to everything Dr. Hunt said, scared, and amazed at all that had happened since 2050. After she had finished, James took the time to think about this.

"So New York has changed as well?"

"Yes James, if you were to go out there now, you wouldn't recognise it probably." Another doctor, middle-aged male, walked up to Dr. Hunt.

"Are you going to tell him the 'other' thing?" James looked confused.

"Other thing? I thought Dr. Hunt had told me everything..." The new doctor shook his head.

"Not quite...you see as well as having your aging process stopped, you were also put into a cryogenic chamber so you wouldn't wake up early. Also, 5 years ago we introduced your body to biomodification to speed up the healing process." James blinked

"Biomodification?" Then he remembered about what the madman had said. _The age of biomodified humans.... _The male doctor nodded his head.

"Yes, biomodification...oh yes, I almost forgot. I'm Dr. Gillard." The doctor brought out his hand and James shook it.

"Nice to meet you....so what does this mean?"

"It means that you're kind of like a cyborg...well not yet, it's not fully activated, we were waiting until you woke up to begin the final stage."

"Fully activated?" Then Dr. Hunt began to speak.

"Yes, it means that all the systems will be active. Which means you can get status reports on your body, keep track of your health and bioenergy, se-" James suddenly interrupted Dr. Hunt, waving his arms a little.

"Hold on, hold on, wait a second, bio-what?"

"Bioenergy, allows you to use your Biomods." Dr. Hunt replied. James blinked and then shook his head.

"Ok, this is going to need some getting used to..." Dr. Gillard nodded a little and then put his hand on James' shoulder.

"We're going to need to do another operation to activate the biomods, you ready to continue" James looked at Dr. Gillard.

"Hey, I haven't been awake that long and now you wanna put me back to sleep?! Why couldn't you have activated the biomods when you put them in me?!"

"Because we needed to know if you were going to live, no good activating them if you were going to die" James rolled his eyes.

"Great..." Dr. Gillard sighed. This was going to be harder than he expected it to be.

"Listen, we'd rather we get this over and done with quickly. That way we can release you from hospital early." James put his hand to his forehead.

"Do I get any choice in the matter?" Dr. Gillard nodded and James sighed.

"......All right then, fine, I'll go through with it" Dr. Gillard clapped his hands together.

"Alright, we'll get the operating room ready for use. Just stay put for the moment." James smirked a little.

"Well where else am I going to go?" Dr. Gillard chuckled and walked off, Dr. Hunt following. James looked up at the ceiling and sighed, slowly closing his eyes and thinking to himself.

_Guess what James? The life you once knew is over...looks like this is going to be the first day of the rest of your life..._


	3. Chapter 2: Systems Activated

Chapter 2: Systems Activated

James opened his eyes again, wondering when the operation was going to take place. He then jumped out of his skin to find two bars, one blue and one red, were near the top of his vision on either side. There was also an empty bar towards the bottom right of his vision, and to the right of his vision was six boxes, a symbol in each box. James sat up and got out of bed, looking around. He found a mirror and looked in to it, checking his eyes. To his confusion the bars were not on his eyes.

"Weird...."

"Yes, it will be a little weird at first." James jumped out of his skin again as Dr. Hunt spoke. He turned around to find her standing at the door.

"Dr. Hunt! I didn't hear you enter." Dr. Hunt smiles.

"I have quiet footsteps. Anyway, I'm here to tell you what you can now do," She walked over to James slowly "First off, your bars. There should be 3 of them and six boxes." James nods.

"Yeah, one of the bars is empty though."

"That's your ammo counter, you don't have any ammo so it's bound to be empty." James went quiet and Dr. Hunt waved a hand in front of his face. "James?"

"I'm just wondering if it counts all types of ammo" Dr. Hunt shook her head.

"No...only THE type of ammo." James blinked.

"THE type of ammo?" Dr. Hunt nodded, folding her arms.

"Some time ago someone invented a new type of ammo which could be used in every weapon. This universal ammo is used nowadays and all other ammo was scrapped."

"I see.....so you pull out a pistol and fire it, then you pull out a shotgun and fire it, and it uses the same ammo?"

"Yes, every weapon out there so far uses the universal ammo. Except different weapons use up varying amounts of ammo." James tilted his head.

"What do you mean?" Dr. Hunt tried to think of an example.

"Well....say you fire a basic pistol, that is going to use up not a lot of ammo each shot. Then you fire a rocket launcher, or a flamethrower. Those are going to use up way more ammo than the pistol would. Understand?" James nodded.

"Yeah....man, the world has changed a lot..." Dr. Hunt nodded.

"Yes...anyway, the other two bars should be Red and Blue respectively. The red bar monitors your damage and the blue one monitors your Bioenergy." James examined the damage bar.

"So does that mean I have loads of damage on me?" Dr. Hunt chuckled.

"It doesn't work like that. The more damage you take, the more the red bar decreases. When it gets to zero, you've taken too much damage and you will die." James gulped.

"Well I gotta watch that often then....what's the boxes for?"

"Ah, that's what your biomods are. Those boxes tells you what biomods you have installed on you. We installed them ourselves so it should be, from top to bottom, Light; Regeneration; Cloak; Thermal Masking; Enhanced Strength; and Move Silent." After hearing Move Silent, James laughed.

"Is that why I didn't hear you enter?" Dr. Hunt smirked.

"No, I just have light footsteps." James raised an eyebrow.

"Suuuure you do." Dr. Hunt unfolded her arms, putting her hands on her hips.

"Can I continue now? Anyway, Light turns on a light that is in your eye, allowing you to see in dark places. Regeneration heals you and can bring your damage bar back up to full. Cloak makes you invisible to people and animals and so does Thermal Masking except it only works on robots and cameras. Enhanced strength is self-explanatory and so is move silent. The previous five biomods can be changed for different biomods, but light cannot be changed. Also each biomod, excluding light, can be upgraded up to a maximum level of three." James whistles.

"So that means they are enhanced with each level?" Dr. Hunt nods.

"Yes. Regeneration heals you more with each level and uses up less bioenergy, bioenergy cost is decreased for Cloak with each level, same with Thermal Masking, Enhanced Strength makes you even more stronger with each upgrade and Move Silent allows you to move silently with each level upgraded and decreases fall damage." James looks at his hands

"I see....and each biomod uses up bioenergy?" The doctor shook her head.

"Not all of them. Regeneration, Cloak and Thermal Masking do, but Light, Enhanced Strength and Move Silent don't. This is because Enhanced Strength and Move Silent are always active." James nodded, and then looked confused.

"But what about light?" Dr. Hunt shrugged.

"We have no idea about that." James smirked

"Well that's no good...ok, now what?" Dr. Hunt smiled.

"Try out your biomods...start with Cloak." James nodded and then stood still and silent.

"....Am I invisible yet?" Dr. Hunt shakes her head

"No, it might take some time till you find out how to turn on and off your biomods, but I'll help you. You see the boxes?" James's face seemed to turn into a no nonsense kind of face.

"Well of course, it hasn't disappeared yet." Dr. Hunt folded her arms again.

"Don't get cheeky...well anyway, you need to do something in your brain that will bring up a light around the top box." James blinked.

"Well what do I need to do in my brain?" Dr. Hunt thought about this.

"Try thinking hard about the boxes" James nodded and closed his eyes. Suddenly, for him, the info had disappeared. He opened his eyes again and they reappeared.

"....Handy."

"Sorry, should have said about that. Try without closing your eyes." James nodded again and stood still. After about 5 minutes he looked at Dr. Hunt.

"Finally got it...let me guess, it gets easier as I do it?" Dr. Hunt nodded.

"Yes...now think about moving that light to the cloak symbol" James stood still again and after another 5 minutes he nodded.

"Done."

"Ok, now think about activating that biomod" James sighed and stood still. After yet another 5 minutes, he suddenly disappeared. James looked around.

"Have I done it?" Dr. Hunt nodded. James looked at himself and saw an outline of himself. "Well this isn't good, there's an outline of me!"

"That only you can see, it's so you can see what weapon you're holding...keep an eye on your bioenergy." James blinked and then saw that his bioenergy was almost depleted. He quickly went to turn it off, but was too late. He looked at his hands as he quickly came into view.

"Heheheh....oops....is there any way to regain my bioenergy?" As soon as he said this a repair bot came into the room. James looked at the bot and blinked "Is that a repair bot?" Dr. Hunt nodded.

"Yes James. There are two ways to regain your bioenergy. The first way is by using power cells, which we will be giving you five of ours before you leave. The second way is to walk up to a repair bot. Try it." James looked hesitant, but then nodded. He walked up to the repair bot, which then bleeped.

"Damage detected. Repairing." the bot said as it brought it's arm out towards James. James closed his eyes, thinking it would hurt. Suddenly the bot spoke again.

"Repairs complete." James opened his eyes and saw his bioenergy bar was maxed out. He looked at himself.

"Well...that didn't hurt..." He looked at Dr. Hunt. "When do I leave?" Dr. Hunt smirked

"As soon as you get your clothes on." James looked at himself again, noticing for the first time he still had the hospital pyjamas on.

"Oh, yeah. That might help. Where are-"

"Bedside cabinet, bottom drawer, as good as new." He opened the drawer and looked at his clothes. He could hardly tell if these were repaired or were brought at a shop.

"You can change in the bathroom." Dr. Hunt pointed towards a door as James took out the clothes. He walked towards the bathroom and entered, locking the door behind him. He began to get dressed, no longer wondering if these were repaired or not. He could tell that they were his, they felt broken in. Lastly putting on his leather jacket, he looked in the mirror. He noticed his eyes looked different from Dr. Hunt's. He walked out and was about to ask her about it when she handed him a pair of stylish sunglasses.

"People can tell if you're biomodified or not by looking at your eyes. Put these on when out in public." James put the sunglasses on and looked at Dr. Hunt.

"Why do I need to wear them in public?" Dr. Hunt put a hand on his shoulder.

"You're not the only biomodified human. And there are people out there who hate biomodified humans...in fact some people will even try to kill you if they found out. Especially the Knights Templar. Steer clear of them. Oh! Before I forget..." Dr. Hunt pulled a card out of her pocket and handed it to James.

"We managed to find the address of 2 of your friends, they wanted us to send you over when you came to...which was 20 years ago, but this is their current address. You remember Karl and Laura right?" James nodded and pocketed the card.

"Ok, thanks Dr. Hunt." James walked out of the room and walked down the corridors, following the signs to the exit. Meanwhile, in James' hospital room, Dr. Hunt was still there, thinking. She hmmed and walked out of the room and headed for her office. Closing and locking the door behind her, she picked up the receiver for her phone and dialled a number.

".....Hi, it's me.....no I wasn't able to sabotage the operation, too many doctors.....well I wasn't properly equipped to take him on, he has got enhanced strength you know.....yes, he has got weaknesses......he can't turn on or off his biomods quite that well yet......yes, I know where he is heading. I'll send an email with the address......you might want to perform recon first, it should help in the long run.....very well sir, glory to the Knights Templar! Lt. Hunt out."


End file.
